Today’s postcard comes from Sandra Brandt who is doing a Library Internship at VIS School Library in Al Wakrah, Qatar. Thanks Sandra!

Greetings from VIS school library in Al Wakrah, Qatar. The school has pupils from a variety of countries, with the majority from Qatar. The school was purpose built, with a gorgeous library space included in the plan on the second floor of the building. They are indeed fortunate to have a library large enough to match a small public library in some cities. A Kindy library was recently also opened on the ground floor for the little ones in pre-Kg and KG.

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The school is a separate gender school with one side for boys and the other for girls, from Kindy to Gr 9s (expanding to Gr 10 in 2016). Because of this, the library is divided down the middle at the service desk, and what you see on one side is duplicated on the other. All the materials, displays, notices etc. are duplicated, which makes for some interesting library management. Fortunately their lovely librarian from the US is highly qualified and extremely proficient. There are no computer stations as yet, but each child has access to a laptop (connected to Wi-Fi) which they can bring to the library for lessons or research.

The school is fairly new, having only opened in 2014. Many of the students were not acquainted with the concept of a library. It is rewarding to watch them grow into ‘their library’ and to witness their excitement as they experience story-time, discover new books, popular series, sample different authors and explore the wonderful offering of non-fiction the library houses.